NINE

      

 

The blue sphere suddenly grew fainter, its peculiar light dying away. Elayne started up as the shadows closed, but before the chamber was completely enveloped in blackness he struck a spark. Flame burst from the pile of charred linen in a small brass tinder bowl. For an instant, as the little fire flared, his face was hued in red like a youthful demon bending over his inferno.

He drew back from the smoke spiraling upward and quickly lit a candle, snuffing the tinder bowl with a metal lid. The candle made a brighter, warmer light—trading smoke and unsteady illumination for dyeing everything in more comfortable and human hues.

Outlined by dancing shadows, he clasped the belt again about his hips, girding himself with swift skill. As he moved away from her, Elayne found herself growing deeply chilled in her damp smock. He handed her one of the towels.

"Bind up your hair."

She glanced at him as she took it, shaking her hair back over her shoulder. He watched her, holding the candle, as she lifted her arms to coil her hair. She felt as if she were on indecent display, as close to naked as it was possible to be while wearing a garment. But they were in this secret place. He had made himself her bridegroom here, by force and blood. No witnesses, no banns, no Christian troth-plight or vows. He simply declared it, and ravished her. A pagan wedding between heathen beasts.

She damned him, despised him for bringing her down to his dark vice, but she thought wildly that it suited her. Somewhere there was a paper, full of high clerks’ seals, assenting to her betrothal to Franco Pietro of the Riata. In dreamlike despair, under Lancaster’s daunting eye and Lady Melanthe’s chill acquiescence, she had put her hand to it in England on the day after the May.

She broke that contract now, with contempt. No one had tried to spare her, beyond mere weeping and regret. Not her godmother, nor her sister—not even Raymond. They had all bowed unquestioning to the Duke of Lancaster and flung her to the wind of fortune, until this pirate caught her up.

From this night, he said, your protection is all of my ambition.

She submitted to his study as he had allowed her to look at him, dipping her head to wrap the towel about her hair and then lifting her chin when she had the linen secure. If she were a wanton creature, an unfettered, unchristian harlot with too much learning to be modest; if she could never have the man she loved—wella, then she would take a beautiful murderous bandit instead, and read his books and learn his wiles and live with him in wickedness.

He threw open a chest and dragged a folded robe from inside, shaking it out in the dim light. "Wear this."

It was scarlet, cut full like a long tunic, embroidered about the hem and throat with astrologic motifs of indigo thread. The sleeves draped down over her hands. The hem fell in a voluminous puddle about her feet, measured for his height and breadth. But it was dry. She turned her back and divested herself of her chilly undergarment by wriggling free of it from within the capacious folds.

She kicked the wet smock out from under her feet and faced him. He was daubing a cloth on his shoulder, scowling at the smudges of blood as if he had never had a cut upon him before.

"Do you think it will leave a scar?" she asked with light malice.

"Nay, I do not scar," he said. He gave her a half-smile, almost an apology.

It was true that he had no flaw on him. But for the place her teeth had scored, now turning black-and-blue, the skin of his chest and face and arms was perfect in the candlelight, unscathed by any injury. He blotted at the abrasion again, hissing air between his teeth.

"Leave it be," Elayne said.

"It stings."

"Of course, if you will pester at it like a child."

He flicked the bloodied cloth away. But still he had that odd ghost of a smile.

"It requires an herbal compress to take out the bruise," she said.

"An herbal compress," he echoed in a bemused tone.

"Have you never heard of such? I suppose you have no books of simples among all these weighty treatises."

"No," he said. "I prefer to confound my brain with arcane wisdom only." From beside the cot he took a box, bejeweled and enameled, lined with silver, and held it open to her. "But spare no compassion for my battle wound. Will you indulge in a gentler pleasure?"

Elayne peered inside. She expected jewels, or some other hoard, but it was full of many-colored grains, their hues reflecting in the shiny lid. When she hesitated, he dug his fingers into the mound and lifted them, the grains clinging to his skin and falling through his hand. He took some from his palm onto his tongue and savored it. "Confetti." He raised his hand to Elayne’s lips.

Some of the grains on his fingertips clung as he touched her mouth. She licked her lip in spite of herself. The rich flavor of candied seeds of coriander and spices filled her mouth, bitter and sweet at once, drowning out the lingering taste of his blood.

"A particular specialty of Monteverde," he said.

She sat down on the carpet-covered chest, biting the sticky grains from her lip, each seed a burst of aromatic spice. "Yes. My sister repined for such."

"Poor damsel," he said. "Breaking her heart over sweetmeats, is she?"

Elayne glanced at him. "She’s mentioned often how she missed it."

He poured more confetti into his palm, shut the box with a snap, and set it aside, as if the topic bored him.

"She never spoke of missing you," Elayne said, with the same intent she’d felt when she had scored him with her teeth.

The shaft did not seem to touch its mark. "I’m certain that she didn’t. She was acutely pleased to be rid of me. Are you jealous that I loved her once?"

"No!"

"Alas," he said lightly. "Will I never win a lady’s heart?" 

"You can hardly expect to win my heart by the manner of your courting!"

" ’Tis fortune that all I require is the use of your body." He lifted his chin and tossed the confetti into his mouth. Then he offered his open palm, covered with a frost of the glistening grains. "Wound me again, hell-cat," he said, holding it to her lips.

She turned her head. "Don’t call me that." It was too close, too near a twisting of Raymond’s endearment into this underground mating like barbarians.

He dusted the seeds away between his palms. "My graceless love talk!" he said. "I beg your pardon, most worshipful and obedient wife."

"I have made no vow to obey you."

"Nay, I place no dependence on vows." He reached out and brushed a clinging grain from the corner of her mouth with his thumb. Elayne wet her lips, tasting sugar; tasting his blood. "They are easily made and easily broken. I don’t aim to direct your whole existence, but when I require that you obey me, you may be certain that you will."

He spoke with such simple ruthlessness that she could find no way to defy him that did not seem merely weak and peevish. Instead she drew the scarlet wizard’s robe close and looked about the little chamber, where candlelight danced on gold and pearls and his bared skin. "Demon!" she said sullenly. "I must be halfway to Purgatory."

"Aye, it is a desolate place," he said, disregarding her insult casually. "I’ve felt so myself, banished here, but we will not be condemned to this island for long."

Elayne glanced quickly at him. "You are condemned here?"

"Did you suppose I live in exile by choice? You named me outlaw, and it is the vile truth. I am a declared felon."

"Fie, if you will turn to piracy—how else?"

He flicked the little silver clockwork with his finger and made the bell ring. "I was cast out for who I am, not what I do. If I prey upon Riata commerce, ’tis not robbery, but justice."

"Blessed Mary, all this?" She lifted a hand toward the riches that surrounded them. Her fingertips barely showed beneath the overlong sleeves of his robe. "Only of the Riata?"

"Your province is great in trade, Princess," he said.

She looked aside at him. "Did you build this castle?"

"I had the walls and towers raised. The foundations lay here in ruin before I came."

"That strange black stone, and the fine porticos, and the Moorish tiles, and the frescoes in your chambers?"

"I brought the stone from the mountains of Atlas. The porticos and chambers, and my observatory and study and—other things—aye, I caused them to be made to my desire."

"And the bridges?"

He smiled. "The bridges are ancient, like that great sculpture on the headland."

"A curious exile! I do not believe you rob only the Riata."

He looked at her with a wicked gleam. "I have certain friends. Sometimes they make me gifts, in return for—dispensation— from pillage on the seas."

"An opportune arrangement!" she said. "From your pillage, I conceive."

"How you rejoice to abuse my character!" His brows rose in a pained expression. "Can you not believe that I do my friends an honest service?"

"No doubt you serve them as honestly as you have served me," she snapped, with a lift of her chin.

He shrugged. "You will be more satisfied when we return to Monteverde."

"Monteverde." She looked away uneasily. "Depardeu, I would rather by far live banished here." 

"Pah, this barren island?"

"It is not so unpleasant. Your castle, and the clear sea." She surprised herself, to realize that she meant it. "In truth—I think it somewhat beautiful, though the climate is too sultry," she said.

"Nay, you’ve forgotten the sweet airs of your own home. The passes of Monteverde are protected, but the breeze still comes cool from the north. The mountains give such shelter to the lake that it’s warm in winter and refreshing in the summer. There is no finer climate in the world."

"With no doubt rainbows every eve!" she said mockingly.

"No, but I will order it for you if you like," he said, with a slight bow.

"Certainly—when you are ruler there—Pirate."

He leaned over her. "I think you prefer me as a pirate." She tried to avoid him, but he caught her wrists in his hands as she pushed away. "I think you are half-brigand in your heart yourself."

"No." She could feel the dust of the confetti still on his fingers, a faint sandy grit, a scent of spice between his skin and hers. Her body ached where he had forced himself upon her. But when he touched her, leaned close to her, the pain seemed to turn and twist into an unspeakable throbbing sweetness. She stared into his beautiful dark eyes.

"Do you claim your sister made you into such a tame rabbit as she? Or did she only succeed in teaching you to fear the place that belongs to you?"

Elayne jerked, but could not free herself. "You speak as if there is nothing to fear there."

"No more than here, or your freezing English mud pit, or anywhere that men live and die by fortune and the will of God Almighty."

"What lies! When you say you are a murderer yourself by trade."

He let her go and stepped back. "I am." 

Elayne released a breath. "And you profess I have nothing to fear?"

"There is much to fear," he said quietly. "Everywhere."

She thought suddenly of what he had said, that he dreaded to be defenseless. She lifted her eyes and met his. "Are you afraid, then?"

He tilted his head, watching her. "It is foolish not to fear," he said, "but it is a grave error to give way to it. So I have learned to keep my wits and countenance in the face of any fell thing."

"And your weapons always within reach," Elayne said. "We did not have to live that way at Savernake."

"Not you perchance, my lady. But someone did."

She opened her lips to make a denial, and found that she could not. There was always a guard on duty at the gates of Savernake, and through the night the familiar calls and clatter of men changing watch upon the parapets. Even there, they had seen smoke from the property of the King’s tax collector when the peasants revolted. Sir Guy had ridden out with men-at-arms to block the rebels on the road to the castle, while Cara had wept and prayed for two days and nights in succession. Even at peaceful Savernake.

He crossed his arms and leaned back, looking down at her through his heavy lashes. It was as if her grim angel had come to earth, and instead of holding back the shadows, he pulled them toward her and bade her not to flee.

"But you are banished by law from Monteverde?" she asked with faint hope. "You may not travel there?"

"I am declared dead if I enter there, or any allied country. I cannot come into most of the Tuscan provinces, nor set foot in the lands of the Holy Roman Empire. I am outlawed in Aragon and the kingdom of Sicily." His hair fell over his shoulder, shadowing his one-sided smile. "The Pope of Rome has excommunicated me, and the anti-pope has, too, though it must be the only matter those pious jesters have agreed upon yet."

For several moments she stared at the flawless line of his jaw, his face, his mouth—absorbing the full force of what he said. Easy to say to herself in a moment of wrath that she would live with him in wickedness, but she began to comprehend the depth of what she had fallen into.

"When they sort out who is the true pope," he said, "I’ll go and throw myself on my knees to beg for absolution. But pray do not expect me to do it twice."

"And you mean to attempt to claim Monteverde for yourself?" she asked incredulously.

"For both of us."

"Do me no such kindness!" she exclaimed.

"Providence has done it for you. My father meant to unite our blood. Princess Melanthe denied him that prospect once, but fate bestows it now again."

"An evil fortune," she said. "Bound by rapine to a man outlawed from church and home!"

"Better by far than if you had married the Riata, my beloved." He smiled at her as sweetly as a fallen angel. He reached out and touched her hair, brushing his hand tenderly over her cheek and her lips. "You have me now for your sword and shield—instead of your assassin."

 

* * *

 

In the silence of the tunnels, in the space between innocence and iniquity, she had near forgotten that the storm still raged above. They ascended by his secret ways, turning and climbing in the light of a common lantern. A deep sound began to grow as they mounted a set of spiraling steps, a rumble that became a howl. At the top, the dim light cast flailing shadows on the back of a tapestry, highlighting the uneasy motion of the woven folds. He shoved the hanging aside.

Beyond, the gale lashed the castle, raging through the open galleries and whistling in the shuttered windows. The lantern’s fitful light showed his bedchamber, the great arcade doors creaking and straining ominously. Elayne realized that driven rain was seeping over the thresholds.

"Mary and Joseph," he muttered, gripping her elbow. "On guard."

He pulled her into the chamber. As they ran across it, the wind rose to a yet higher scream, as if it boiled up at the very hope of reaching them through the walls. An ungodly cracking rent the air. The lantern flame vanished into utter blackness. She heard wood strike stone, the deafening thud of timbers collapsing. The arched doors burst open as if smashed by a battering ram. The explosion of wind threw her back, tearing her from his hold.

He shouted at her. Elayne had no time to cry out. She groped for something to cling to against the invading whirlwind; in the dim confusion she found his arm reaching for hers. He gripped her elbow with an agonizing clench, dragging her with him through the roiling darkness. She could feel the whoosh of wind at her back, heard the scream of air rushing past into hollow passages. He yanked her forward; she knew not where. With a deep boom, some unseen door closed behind them. The storm receded to the faint bellow of a distant beast.

Elayne drew in a gasp of air. "God defend us!" She had never experienced a tempest of such savagery, that pounded and screeched and attacked like a living thing. She crossed herself in the blackness. "God spare us."

"You are not hurt?" His grip on her arm did not lighten.

"By mercy, no." She had a moment of vast gratitude that he had led her from the headland when he did. The force of the tempest had increased a hundredfold; she would have been carried long since into the sea if he had not brought her away to shelter.

Abruptly he plunged on, finding his way through the tunnels without a flicker of light, pulling her along behind him. She tripped over the hem of the robe, stubbing her toes and cracking her elbows until he stopped so suddenly that she collided with him.

Light poured into the tunnel as he opened a door. She heard the storm again, though not so loud, along with human voices. There was a peculiar geometry to the corridor before them: corners and ceiling that did not seem to meet in the expected places.

He glanced aside at her. He released her arm, sending prickles to her fingertips, and slid his hand up behind her loosened hair to the nape of her neck. She felt the strength of his fingers in her hair. With the faintest pull, he drew her toward him.

Elayne resisted. Standing in the half-light, he smiled at her. A dark smile, as if there were a mortal secret between them. He curled her hair about his fist and bent his face into it, drawing a long breath. Her lips parted on a silent whimper, a secret moan of bitter pleasure.

Abruptly he let her go. With a decisive move, he turned to face the blank stone of one wall. To her shock, he walked right into it.

It seemed to disappear as he did it; become an opening that she had not realized was there. He looked back at her. "Come."

Elayne stepped forward, almost expecting to find the stone spring up before her. But it did not. For an instant, from the corner of her eye, it seemed as if a red figure leaped at her from behind. Elayne jumped ahead in startlement, but the figure disappeared as if it had never been. With her heart beating hard, she saw that they stood in the gloom of an unlit gallery overlooking a huge stone-walled kitchen. Wind whistled in the chimneys. The smell of smoke and cookery hung thick from the activity below.

A deep-voiced dog barked, and at the same moment a young man shouted joyously, "My lord!"

The multitude of faces below turned up toward them. In the clamor everyone pushed forward. The white puppy came bounding up the stairs, leaping on Elayne’s damp robe with frantic exuberance.

Il Corvo stepped to the rail. The dark mantle he had thrown about his shoulders flared, showing a blood-red lining. Talk ceased instantly. All in his household fell to their knees. The sound of the storm rumbled beyond the heavy walls like a hidden breath that made the torches shudder. Elayne saw Margaret’s yellow head, and even the Egyptian magician’s bald pate, lowered deferentially among a throng of boys and girls. The great dogs roamed between the tables and cook-pots, pure white, the size of wolves.

"Rise," their master said. He spoke in the quicksilver tongue of Monteverde. "I have contrived to recover my bride, as you see."

"God is great!" the young man exclaimed, and a chorus of other voices echoed him. He wore an infidel’s headpiece, a turban topped with a scarlet cap, fancifully embossed with brightly hued patterns. "My lord, we have been fraught with dread."

"No one has gone out in search?" the pirate asked softly.

"No one, my lord!" The youth lifted his chin, a handsome, dark-eyed Ottoman with the forceful look of a man full-grown, though he was yet beardless. "We have bided here as you commanded, though it was painful to check ourselves."

"Well done, Zafer," Il Corvo said.

The young man exhaled a visible breath. He nodded. "My lord."

"Make a place for us. Dario—see to a meal laid. Fatima, set your pretty feet to bring us claret wine. Zafer, Margaret, come up—I desire your attendance."

The assembly burst into motion. Behind Zafer, who mounted the stairs three at a time, Margaret hurried up to Elayne. The maid’s blue eyes brimmed with tears. She fell to her knees at Elayne’s feet, holding the damp scarlet hem to her lips. "Your Grace, I was so frightened! I never meant to displease you so, that you would depart from the castle and stay out in such a storm!"

"It was no fault of yours," Elayne said, misliking the apprehension in the young girl’s voice. She reached down and raised the maid, fending off an eager puppy. " ’Twas another entirely who displeased me."

Margaret’s eyes widened uneasily. "Not Fatima, my lady?" she whispered, bending close.

"No," Elayne said firmly. "Not Fatima."

"Who then displeased you, Princess?" The maid was urgent. "Any fault should be remedied."

Elayne picked up the excited puppy, hefting it in both arms. She looked over her shoulder at the pirate.

"I’ll order myself tossed from a cliff," he said cordially. "Go down now, and dispose yourself in comfort as you may. Zafer— make ready to depart."

The pup squirmed and twisted. Elayne looked down, struggling to hold it and disengage its scrabbling paws from her deep sleeve. As she did, a flash of light burst in the smoky room—a flare that threw everything into blinding relief, a sizzle like lightning had struck inside.

She pivoted. Through the vivid after-shapes that danced in her eyes, she saw no one behind her. The pirate and Zafer were gone.

There was a moment of full silence, and then the others went about their business without any sign of bewilderment.

Elayne blinked. She looked along the whole length of the gallery where they had been standing not moments before, up the curved ribs of stone to where the ceiling vanished in smoky darkness. The walls stood solid—or seemed to. There was no other stairway. The black stone gave back shimmers and shadows in the erratic light of the torches below.

Margaret curtsied with perfect serenity, as quickly turned to smiling as she had been frightened a moment before. Elayne realized how young she was; how young they all were, the assembly of this castle.

"Will you let me help you down the stairs, Your Grace?" the maid asked.